Beach patrol stops scolding women who sunbathe topless

OCEAN CITY, Md. (AP) — Women who sunbathe topless at a Maryland resort town used to get a scolding from beach patrol officers, but that has changed.

WBOC-TV reports (http://bit.ly/2r2tq7f ) Capt. Butch Arbin, thead of Ocean City Beach Patrol, said in a memo Tuesday that workers should document complaints of toplessness, but they shouldn’t approach topless women — even if beachgoers request it.

Chelsea Covington, an advocate for normalizing toplessness, asked Worcester County’s state’s attorney last year to examine the law. He, in turn, asked Maryland’s attorney general for an opinion. Officials haven’t heard back.

For years, Arbin says the beach patrol would just tell topless women “Hey, you can’t do that.” But without an opinion from the attorney general, he says they don’t feel like they can tell women not to sunbathe topless.